Je Ne Sais Pas
by Half-drowned Dracula
Summary: Not in French! The year is 1981 and Severus Snape is making his teaching debut, while the war in the Wizarding world comes to a head. Third chapter!
1. Chapter 1: Quel homme est le Professeur?

_Disclaimer - Hello, my name is Half-drowned Dracula. I am an ugly fifteen-year-old and I live in Surrey (Yes, that's right, Dursley-ville.) I am sharing this bedroom with my thirteen-year-old sister, because I am trapped at my Dad's house. It is three in the morning and I can't sleep. Does any of that sound like something JKR would say? Didn't think so. Work the rest out for yourself._

_Author's Note - Ooh, Lordie, I'm actually trying to write a chaptered fic. Hope this all works out okay. Anyways, I thought I'd centre this on Snape's first ever year teaching, but in the eyes of a Gryffindor, because while most of the fics I've read set around this time were all very good, they were all following a Slytherin character._

_So lets have this in a fresh pair of eyes, shall we? I suggest you read my second Author's Note at the end of this, might explain a few of my ideas. Bear with me about the French thing, it will all become clear in later chapters._

_Following prompting from the lovely __**Splintered Star**__, this chapter has been given a huge makeover. Thus giving me more time to sort out my life before finishing writing the next chapter_

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**Je Ne Sais Pas**

_By Half-drowned Dracula_

Chapter 1 : Quel homme est le Professeur?

"Who's going to take over from Slughorn?" It was the question on everyone's lips ever since we had found out that his leaving wasn't just a rumour. Even we Gryffindor were interested, and I wondered why. The Defence professor changed every year and we barely batted an eyelid. Maybe they were insignificant in our lives.

It was September of 1981, and we sat in our compartment, happily awaiting the beginning of our fourth year, when the professors began treating you less like brainless _things_ and more like real people (or so we had been told). _We_ was us four; we had no dinky little group names, and none of us had special powers or mood eyes; we were just _Us:_ Myself (Maddy); Davine; Hannah and Brandon.

Well, technically, Brandon wasn't part of _Us_, but he was Davine's boyfriend and the two just _came_ together. It didn't matter that we didn't want Brandon and his horrible dirty yellow hair and puffy lips, because Davine was stuck to him like a limpet and refused to let go. There was always a look of wonder in her grey eyes when she looked at him. I know they say "Love is blind", but for him to have any redeeming qualities, she would have had to wipe out all image of him, and replace him with a picture of someone else.

Our journey passed mainly without incident, a few lost first-years came in to visit (and left terrified), and we talked about the new professor. They would, obviously, be teaching Potions, as was the tradition, just as the head of Gryffindor taught transfigurations. Perhaps being of that house gave you extra skill in the class. That would make sense - my potions marks were abysmal, despite the fact that I had a real interest in it.

It was then that Brandon decided to poke his ugly head in the conversation, uninvited of course, his oily nasal tones grating on my nerves.

"I heard that, whoever they are -" Here he paused and breathed in through his congested nose, making a disgusting sound like the last dregs of drink being slurped from a glass with a straw. He obviously thought he was creating suspense, but really he was making me quite nauseous. "- they were one of Slughorn's best ever students. Really good, like…"

I then decided to block out his speech so it became a buzzing white noise in the back of my mind, like a busy hive on a sunny day, and fell asleep, dreaming of Aurors and Death Eaters and the Muggle who had to be obliviated last week because he found a severed hand from a battle in his field. When I awoke, it was dark outside, and Hannah was shaking me rather vigorously, making her blonde hair snap around violently.

"Get changed -" She was saying, while my groggy brain tried to piece it together "- The train is close to Hogsmeade now." I shot upright, ran down the corridor as fast as I possibly could and got dressed, just in time for the train to stop. On finding _Them_ we accompanied each other to the horseless carriages that drove us to school.

The Great Hall was, as usual, decked out with beautiful floating candles, and a huge starry sky greeted us from the roof. Brandon physically dragged Davine down to sit near his friends at the other end of the Gryffindor table, complaining that he'd been around her friends far too much and he "needed a social life".

I sat on Hannah's left, strangely reminiscent of our sorting, when, terrified, I had sat next to the only person not scowling at me. This turned out to be because of my sister, a highly unpopular Slytherin two years above me, who had made it her mission in life to annoy. The first thing Hannah and I did was look at the teacher's table.

"Which man is the professor?"

"They're both professors, Hannah." I gave a soft sigh and rolled my eyes. I could have sworn she wasn't so dim last year, or even during the summer for that matter.

"No, as in, which one is _The_ Professor?"

"I don't know." At this, we began to examine the two new professors.

The first was a plumpish middle-aged man, who only seemed to come in one colour, and that colour was brown. His eyes were a soft beech, his hair maybe a shade darker. His robe was an unfortunate beige, which only served to emphasise the fact that he was sweating like crazy, darkening rings of moisture were spreading around his underarms and across his chest - he looked rather flustered. The professor that really interested me, however, was the second.

Our second new professor didn't come in colours. He didn't even come in tones. He came in black and white. The skin that was showing - his hollow-cheeked face and fragile-looking hands - were hard, cool, porcelain white and his long hair, robes, and - I barely stopped myself from dropping my jaw - eyes were black as raven-feathers. He wasn't handsome at all, his whole face had been taken over by a massively overgrown hooked nose, and the expression settled on his face was so hostile it gave me a headache, daring someone to laugh at him so he could cut them down into painful little shards. But the really shocking thing about this man was that he was _young. _Seventh-year young, youthful even, but without any of the joy or freshness that true youth brought.

Beside me, I could hear Will, a real seventh year this time, breathing out a near silent "No.", and as I looked around, I could see many of the students in the three years above us doing the same.

Hannah interrupted my thoughts - "Which one's which, d'ya recon?"

I shook my head "I haven't a clue. That one -" I nodded towards the young professor "- looks more Dark-Arty, but that one -" The dull professor "- looks like a Hufflepuff, not a Slytherin."

The sorting started, but I don't think anyone was paying attention to it, we continued chattering and looking bemused and the 5th, 6th and 7th years were whispering conspiratorially, punctuated by the hat making it's decisions.

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

"RAVENCLAW!"

"SLYTHERIN!"

"SLYTHERIN!"

"GRYFFINDOR!"

"RAVENCLAW!"

We stopped listening at all, and the talking was so loud I was surprised the hat could hear itself think. Will tilted his head toward me, his hair was similar to Brandon's only sandier in colour, and cleaner. For this, I was forever grateful.

"I wish they'd hurry up. How long does it take to sort less than forty midgets? It didn't take this long for _my_ sorting."

I giggled in a horribly dim-witted fashion, then straightened my face.

"What was so "_No."_ earlier?" I whispered.

Will's face went through a variety of emotions in a second, and then he fixed his warm eyes on me and said "That young bloke - if he is who I think he is, well, he's either going to be brilliant, or bloody awful."

"How so?"

"We're speaking hypothetically here, as in, if he is who I think he is, right?"

I nodded.

"Well, if that's the case, then he really is young. Like, not much older than me. If that should happen to be the case, then he was a fifth year when I was in my first. If that's the case, then he's basically a genius."

"And the problem with that is…?"

"Then the problem with that is that he was a bullied loner, so either he'll teach brilliantly, like, everything he knows about whatever he's teaching, which'll be good, or -"

Suddenly I got what he was on about " - Or he'll be a bitter shit intent on making our lives hell."

"Correct, young Madeline. Hypothetically speaking, of course."

"Of course."

I looked back up to the high table, and Professor Dumbledore began speaking.

"Ah, how wonderful it is to see your faces again - and some new ones." He beamed at us in a weird grandfatherly fashion that was quite pleasing. "As per usual I have some announcements to make.

"As always, the Forbidden Forest is out of bounds to all students, and Mr. Filch would like me to remind you that there is to be no duelling in the corridors, and all prohibited items will be confiscated. The list of these items will be up in his office, should you not want to be taken by surprise. Now -"

We all held our breath. He was about to announce our new professors. It was stupidly exciting.

" - this year we have two new members of the faculty. After Professor Kane's tragic accident last year, Professor Davies will be taking over Defence Against the Dark Arts classes."

Professor Davies, the sweaty, beige professor, stood up and gave silly little nods to each of the house tables. It looked rather like his head was on a string being jerked up and down. Lacklustre applause greeted him.

"So, the news I am sure you have all been waiting for -" Dumbledore twinkled. I hated it when he did that, he always looked so paradoxically young and old at the same time. "- Professor Slughorn has, as you probably know, left Britain for warmer climes, so Professor Snape will be taking over both Potions class and the headship of Slytherin house." He gestured at the young professor.

The Slytherin table clapped and whooped, I could see my sister cheering with a bunch of her horrible friends, and someone down the far end of our table shouted 'I KNEW IT!'. Professor Snape stood up, gave an oddly flourishing bow, as though he was afraid of doing one of Davies' freaky little things, and was hamming it up to avoid it. He obviously realised that it was a little strange, because he gave the whole school a Basilisk-esque stare, and his hands twitched into fists at his sides for a second. Still standing, he raised a sarcastic eyebrow and sat down in his chair again, crossing one leg over the other and surveying the scene, daring anyone to mock his weird bow. No-one did.

Grinning, Dumbledore began talking to us again. "Yes, settle down now, or we'll all lose our appetites." He clapped and dropped into his chair, and there was food on the tables that we hadn't noticed before. I grabbed some potatoes before anyone else got to them. They were always the first to go.

I turned to my left to talk to Will again. I liked him, he was so brotherly towards the lower years. "Was it who you thought it was?"

He stared at the piece of lamb on his fork with his warm blue eyes. "Uh-huh. Now let's just all pray that he wasn't so scarred by his years here that he'll take it out on us."

We sat in silence for a bit, listening to chewing, the sound of metal on porcelain and idle chatter. I looked at Snape again, who was toying with some vegetables with an expression of distaste, then back to Will.

"How'd you know he's a genius?" I hoped I didn't sound too sceptical of Will's judgement.

"My Dad." said Will, scraping his cutlery together, not wanting to elaborate.

"Uh-huh…" I tried to egg him into saying whatever he knew. Finally, he sighed.

"He got his Potions Scroll at nineteen. Which makes him the youngest in Europe for something like six hundred years."

"How'd you know that?" I realised that I was starting to sound very, very annoying, to the point of reminding myself of Brandon, who I could see out of the corner of my eye, brandishing his fork in the air, which had a half-eaten sausage on it. Disgusting.

Will obviously felt the same, because he groaned and said "My Dad's got one too. Snape was his apprentice. Apparently he was really eager to get the qualification, he turned up at our house the morning after the leaver's ball, asking about it. At first, Dad was really doubtful, I mean, most people wait until they're about thirty to start on it, get in some practice, y'know?

"But Snape turned up, literally just out of school, eighteen years old, and goes "Can I be your apprentice?" Strange, no? Anyway, Dad took him on, and by the end of the week he was singing his praises. Genius is the only explanation for that."

A sixth-year girl with blonde-brown hair, Janine, looked up from the opposite side of the table from us and joined our conversation.

"Oh yeah. He's only twenty-one now."

I had a mouthful of green beans. "How'd you know that?!" Oh, the questions again. I really was irritating.

"He's already been included in the newest version of _Hogwarts : A History_. Youngest ever Professor. Before him it was some bloke called Knep, and he was twenty-five. It's weird, to think we were actually in school at the same time as him, passing him in corridors, listening to Slughorn rambling about how he could make this potion perfectly in his first year -"

" - Laughing when he was being humiliated…" Will ended bitterly.

Janine and I both stared at him. We'd never heard him say anything other than nice things to people, and he seemed angry. He shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

"What? I just - Look, I spoke to him a few times, years ago. He seemed like a good bloke, especially for a Slytherin, and he was - hurt, y'know, because no-one took him seriously, and -" He faded into silence, and suddenly, after years of seeing him as my second brother, Will seemed a mystery to me.

Janine looked apologetically at me, and we finished our meals in silence.

Dumbledore released us from the hall, and me, Hannah and Davine trundled back to the common room ("Password?" "Hippogriff") and into our dorm, which now proclaimed us as 'Fourth Year Girls'.

We were joined shortly by the two other fourth year girls (It still sounded odd to me, I was just getting used to being a 'Third Year Girl'), Megan (who, as usual didn't look happy about sharing a room with us) and Emma (who insisted on giving everyone a hug because 'someone in her extended family was Italian'). I may have been excited about the start of the year, and confused about Will, but I was also insanely tired, and dropped off just after midnight, my mind a swirling mess.

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_Author's Note: It is no longer three in the morning, it's eleven past one, and I'm in my own bedroom at my Mum's place. On a different day, of course, I have no time-turner. But I wish I did._

_Much love for **whitehound** for pointing out silly mistakes, and annoying fandomisms. Howsa Potions Scroll sound? Surely you can't just turn up with a NEWT to get a job at a school - think about in our Muggle world, you can't teach at sixth-form college with an A-level, or at secondary school with a GCSE. Thus my made up qualification._

_Anyway, how was it? The whole Will/Snape relationship will come into light later chapters. If anyone reading is a fan of the Belgian Francophone singer Jacques Brel, and recognise the title of this, I applaud your taste, but you're also getting a sneaky peek at what's coming later in the story, and it might not be what you think._

_Yes, I want to know all about what you think about this, don't leave anything out. And I particularly want to hear what you think about all of those OCs. Do they fit in? Do they seem real? You know the drill._

_And also, what do people eat at meals like the Hogwarts feast? I'm a vegetarian, therefore at these kind of shindigs (word of the week) I get stuck with the 'vegetarian option' which is nearly always either a badly defrosted bean-burger type thing, or a salad. I haven't a clue about food._

_If I don't update within a month, I give you permission to jab me with a pointy stick until I bleed, understand?_

_Anyways, please, please, please review. I promise to reply and explain/answer/debate/be ashamed. I need to work out if it's really necessary to update soon, because I have __**BIG**__ exams coming up, causing __**BIG**__ stress._

_Review and I love you :D_


	2. Chapter 2: Le premier jour des cours

_Disclaimer - Hello, my name is Half-drowned Dracula. My mother has shut off the internet to my laptop (Which has a broken fan and can only be kept on for half-hour intervals), so I am writing fanfic instead of reading it. Did JKR ever say that? No. What does that mean? That's right - H-dD is not JKR and does not own Harry Potter or anything to do with it._

_Author's Note - Second chapter please. Classes start for Maddy and the gang, not without a touch of tragedy._

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**Chapter 2 : Le premier jour des cours**

I didn't wake up feeling refreshed. I didn't think anyone had since the start of the war. As was the (unintentional) tradition, I woke up last, and was forced to get ready in five minutes. Walking into the Great Hall, part of my hair was rumpled, refusing to bow to gravity, and I was trying to apply eyeliner without a mirror. Needless to say, I failed miserably at that, and wandered around all day oblivious to the wiggly lines drawn around my eyes until late at night when I went to remove it.

_We_ sat together, munching on toast and marmalade, pondering what our first lessons would be, and anticipating the arrival of the _Daily Prophet_ with something akin to fear. Owls began swooping into the Great Hall, a huge rushing wave of them, dropping papers and letters in front of every seat. There was a newspaper in front of the seat I assumed would be Snape's, an empty chair up at the head table, creating an odd gap right next to Professor Davies, in all his beige splendour, who was sipping at almost cream-coloured, revoltingly milky tea.

I didn't receive anything. I was so afraid of finding a dead friend or family member on the front page of the _Prophet_ that I had cancelled my subscription months ago, and I didn't plan on renewing it. I felt a sharp poke on my left arm and turned to see Hannah, pushed so close against me I couldn't see the lower half of her face. Her hazel eyes were wide and she jabbed her finger again, not on me, but in the air, towards Davine on the other side of the table, silent.

The look on her face was still, usually beautiful features becoming hideous in a mask of mingled terror, pain and anguish. Her mouth sat open in a soundless scream, revealing dainty white rows of teeth, and ever so slowly, she turned the front page of the paper toward us, where I could see a glittering Dark Mark in the inset picture.

**McSorley Parents Killed as Death Eater Fire Guts Family Home**

We watched her, worried, as she choked out a single word.

"Brandon." Somehow, we never thought the suffering would get so close to us. To think that _Brandon,_ Brandon McSorley, _Davine's boyfriend_ Brandon McSorley's parents were dead was _frightening._ Who knew who would be next. It was my deepest fear that in the near future, in the dead of night, Death Eaters would come and _Avada_ my Muggle Grandmother. We did a pretty good job of acting as if we were Pure-Bloods, us Linures. My mother's father was related to the Blacks by some tenuous link, and my father's side were all Pure-Bloods from Ireland. It was easy to pretend that Grandma was a Pure-Blood witch if you kept her hidden, but everyone was becoming more and more exposed.

Davine stood and ran from the Great Hall in tears, she had met Brandon's parents in the summer and had seemed to be quite taken by them. I watched them smile and wave from the page, his mother had his hair, and his father his mouth, and I found myself thinking that maybe they weren't such disagreeable features after all.

Hannah and I stood up to chase after Davine, but Professor McGonagall was handing out timetables and shouted at us.

"Miss Linure! Miss Beldry! What _do_ you think you are doing, exactly?"

We walked closer, not wanting to shout back.

"But Professor -"

"- Davine -"

"- Brandon -"

"- The McSorley Murders -"

McGonagall frowned. "Girls, I understand that you are concerned for your friend, but Miss Butters will be _fine_. I believe that she and Mr McSorley are outside conferring right now. It may not be prudent to interrupt."

We nodded and parked ourselves back at the Gryffindor table, having forgotten all of our previous conversation.

Snape chose this moment to sweep in, like the proverbial bat out of hell, clearly livid. McGonagall smirked and turned to him.

"Stressful first morning, Severus?" she said, just a little too sweetly, and I wondered if she didn't like him. It was understandable, of course; a boy she was teaching just four years previously was now her colleague and contemporary - it would be unnerving. He scowled.

"Peeves! Blasted thing scattered everything down the corridors!" He indicated the schedules in his pale hands. "One day, I'm going to exorcise that poltergeist myself."

"Oh, I'm sure you will." Nodding at her, he excused himself, billowing off impressively to the Slytherin table.

Hannah and I were handed our timetables, and I looked at what we had that day - Double Herbology with the Ravenclaws, Transfiguration with Slytherin, lunch, Divination then Potions with the Hufflepuffs.

A short sixth year boy with bug-eyes glanced up from his own timetable, frowning.

"Anyone else got Snape today?"

A frightened looking second year nodded, adding "First lesson." I watched him peek at Snape, still angry over by the Slytherins, passing timetables around.

"Ouch." hissed the bug-eyed sixth year, who I think was called Michael. "Got 'im third, myself, with the Slyths." I grimaced - he would have class with my sister, then.

"Well, you'll have to tell me how he is," I said, anxious. "We all know how I am in Potions, I have to work out how long I have to live."

Michael laughed, screwing up his funny eyes. "Poor, poor Maddy. You really just don't have the knack for it, do you?"

Grinning at me, Hannah snorted "Hah, remember when you somehow managed to make that gas that turned everyone's skin hot pink?" I blushed and she murmured, mostly to herself - "Good times…"

"Oh, I was more thinking of the time you bought ol' Sluggy out in boils, and we ended up with that appalling woman covering for a week whilst he was recuperating."

"Merlin, yes!" The two of them became convulsed with laughter, and I groaned. It really wasn't humorous - actually, I was quite hurt. Luckily, or perhaps unluckily, Davine and Brandon returned, hand in hand, breaking up their hysterics.

Davine's eyes were red as though she'd rubbed them violently, Brandon's lips were raw where he'd obviously chewed them, and his chin quivered. I felt instantly awkward - I knew full well that I hated the boy, but I couldn't conjure up my normal feeling knowing he had just become an orphan. I tried my hardest to act natural around him, reminded of when my father had been killed in a battle second year and the sudden, and disturbing, niceness it had brought out in people for the first week or so.

"I'm really sorry, Brandon."

"Sorry."

"What? Oh. Yeah. Thanks." Brandon gave a wobbly smile and sat down. Even his voice wasn't so irritating. "They're not the first people to be killed, and they won't be the last - it's a war." Those words were scarily similar to what my sister had said when Dad was killed.

I had sat with her, in tears, desperate for comfort, in Dumbledore's office late that night, gazing at her, stony-faced in her chair "Rebecca? I'm - Do you want a hug?" The infantile words had slipped from me without a thought, and she had turned, pale eyes burning with anger.

"Madeline, I neither want nor need a hug. Grow up a bit, you're thirteen years old now. Dad took on these risks when he joined the Aurors. Think of every time you've read the papers recently. People die every day and crying and hugs won't stop it.

"If he died in a tragic accident or by deadly illness, we'd have something to be upset about. In war it's kill or be killed - that's what he went out to do - kill. I'd rather have a dead man than a murderer for a Dad. He's not the first, and he won't be the last. That's what war's about."

I noticed tears welling in her eyes and she ran a hand through her mop of thin brown hair that was so like mine. I moved towards her with arms outstretched and she had growled.

"Madeline. Get. Away. From. Me."

"But Becky -"

"I don't need this rubbish. I don't need to give comfort to a Gryffindor _child._ We don't even know each other, Madeline. We share nothing but our parent's genes. Leave me be." She stood and despite her show of strength, her slender frame trembled.

"You're so cold now Becky. You've forgotten everything that's supposed to be important to you." She answered with a look of dark contempt and left, slamming the door behind her. We'd never spoken properly since.

That night I had cried my eyes out in Will's arms.

Brandon was attracting quite a crowd, quite the opposite of what he had intended, it seemed. Will gave him a long look and offered a smile. "You're brave, Brandon." He saw me sitting opposite and his expression turned sheepish.

"I'm sorry about yesterday, Maddy I-"

"-Got upset. We all have our bad days." His face flashed with bright relief and we shared a happy gaze.

The bell rang and we filed out to Herbology, Hannah and I leading the way, Brandon and Davine behind us, whispering sweet nothings of comfort to each other. In the greenhouses, we were separated into partners by Professor Sprout - some of the Gryffindor boys last year had become distracted by having their friends to work with, and thus their marks had suffered. I was teamed with an olive-skinned Ravenclaw boy called Julius, who had thick eyebrows and wild curly hair that plants kept snatching at as we worked.

I offered him my hair tie as he seemed to be having difficulty seeing the Bubotubers, and it looked like I was to be splattered with huge amounts of the repulsive pus. He gave an odd high-pitched little laugh that was very much at odds with his usual deep tone and declined -

"Nonsense, Madeline, I can see this Bubotuber just _fine_."

"It's Maddy, and I doubt that somehow."

"Nooo - Whoa, watch out, you're in my line of fire." I dodged a shower of pus, and he grudgingly accepted the tie. As the lesson progressed, I found myself feeling glad that I was paired with Julius and not Hannah or Davine, for as much as I loved them, we never seemed to get any work done together. I smiled at him as we began a system for squeezing the horrible tubers.

"What've you got next?" I asked him, an innocent and useful conversation starter, I found. He scowled.

"Divination."

"Oh, now I've heard it all, a Ravenclaw in Divination. Why, pray tell?"

Julius looked around shiftily, as though he was telling a secret. "It's said she has _the sight._"

I scoffed at the very idea. "Trelawney? I just chose it because it's a skive."

He gave a deep chortle. "And that's why I stayed on it this year. It's easy really, the more gory and unlikely a death you make up, the higher your grade." We both laughed at that, for it was horribly true.

"Guess I can't die in a potions accident then."

He frowned sadly at me "Oh, I've heard about you in potions. I don't want to be rude or spread rumours or anything, but is it true that Slughorn offered for you to drop it?"

I dropped my head, ashamed, as far as I knew I was the only person to ever be asked if I would give up a core subject. "Yeah. I'm going to fail _magic_." I moaned bitterly.

Julius became oddly buoyant again, and shook his head in a friendly fashion. "That's drivel, that is. You're perfectly good at Herbology, see? And I've heard tell that you've got perfect marks in Charms all last year. You won't fail _magic_, you're not a Muggle or a Squib, you've just got potions problems."

That cheered me up as we cleaned up and headed off to Transfiguration. The nine Slytherins from our year lounged outside the classroom, quicker than us as they didn't need to clean pus up or come in from outside. Johan Wilksom sneered at us, clearly pleased with himself.

"Alright, McSorley? Heard Mummy and Daddy got burned to death, now that is a _shame_."

All of us Gryffindors openly glared at him, which only seemed to stoke his fire.

"Don't get rude now."

"You can shut up, Wilksom!" Oh no, I was doing that horrible 'Your-Parents-Died-So-I'll-Be-Uber-Nice' thing. He ran a hand over his head, so the bristly hairs gave a rippling effect as they snapped back into place, straight upward.

Danielle Marling, a scrawny Slytherin, puckered her face like she'd just been forced to lick a banana peel. "Oh, I'm scared Linure. You can't do anything but blow people up, and we're not in your potions class anymore." She gave me a smug look and the Slytherins tittered.

"I said '_Shut up_'."

"Truth hurts, don't it, Linure?"

I was seriously considering whipping my wand out and jinxing her into some kind of ooze, but McGonagall chose that moment to step outside and usher us in.

We started some prepatory work on Switching Spells, that I couldn't remember the next lesson, because just about everyone in class had spent the whole time staring at members of the other house threateningly, and occasionally stroking their wand and muttering darkly to themselves. The lunch bell came around quicker than we expected, and everyone rushed out of class into the Great Hall.

I had got myself a plate of Shepard's pie, and sat down with _them_ (Plus Brandon, who just stared into the distance, sometimes looking at us and smiling like he was listening to the conversation.) About ten minutes later, Michael stormed in in a temper.

"He's a cock! And absolute bloody cock!"

"Who's a cock?" asked Davine in a helpful sort of voice.

"Bloody, freaking… _Snivellus_ - That's who."

We must have looked quite perplexed, because he gave a sudden eager grin and said -

"Oh, you never did meet the Marauders, did you? Now there was a bunch of guys who could pull off a prank. Nah, I meant _Snape_."

Brandon gave an annoying laugh that reminded me of, well, himself, although his eyes didn't meet anyones as he did so. "Snivellus - brilliant. Remind me to use that." he said to Davine, who shook her head reproachfully.

"Don't, Brandon. We haven't even met the man."

"Didn't you just hear me call him a cock?"

Janine gave a worried nod and sat down next to me. "Sorry, but Michael's right. He's a real bastard - Cruel, biased and _nasty_."

"Yeah! Do you know what he said at the end of the lesson? Do you actually know? He said 'I don't know how most of you got an E in potions, but next year I'll be raising the entry level.' He gave that bitch Linure - No offence -"

"- None taken -"

"- Five points for answering a really easy question, and didn't give any to Gryffindor all lesson, even though Janine's potion was the best in the class, even better than your sister's."

"Bad luck, Maddy. Better start writing your will." Someone laughed as I slumped against the table, groaning in misery. It was then that a second year stuck his little round head up and said -

"Snape's not _that_ bad."

Michael, Janine and the rest of the sixth years stared, before chorusing in horror. "WHAT?!"

"He isn't, I mean, he's sort of… funny."

"WHAT?"

He trembled a little bit, and pushed his glasses closer to his eyes. "Just, like, he's - clever, y'know? He knows everything, where you've gone wrong, he can work it out just by looking, but he's not that horrid about it. He just makes it a joke. I think - I think…"

His voice quietened under the glare of the sixth years, and he finally whispered "I think he's better than Slughorn."

Anyone outside the Great Hall would probably think that the shout made by the sixth year Gryffindors was that of the whole school.

"WHAT?!"

Michael's eyes were almost popping out of his head. "You're kidding, right, Kid? Right now I think I'd pay Slughorn from my own pocket if he'd came back."

The second year rubbed his hands together, fearing their wrath. "Slughorn never paid much attention to us though. And he was a bit of a racist, I think."

Michael shook his head in dismay, dismissing the boy with a wave of his hand before concentrating on his food, which was probably cold. "Mental."

When the bell signalling the end of lunch rang, Hannah and I went off to Divination, whilst Davine and Brandon walked, their steps perfectly in synch, to Care of Magical Creatures. ( I personally had dropped that - It was quite off-putting to see the teacher getting bitten or slashed to pieces every lesson.)

Trelawney launched herself out of her seat in the shadows (probably just to scare us) and waved her arms about a bit, bangles clanking on her bony wrists. "YOU -" she wailed at Hannah " - Tragedy will bestow itself upon your familiar!"

"My toad died last year, Professor." Hannah answered. "Sorry to prove you wrong there."

She looked a little worried and floated off to a different member of our class with a loud "MY DEAR BOY! -" Hannah and I lowered ourselves into the squashy chairs littering the room and waited for Trelawney to tell us to do something almost productive. This turned out to be learning about what planets we were born under. I squinted at the chart.

"I've got brown hair and light blue eyes, so that means I've got the influence of…"

"Neptune, my dear, dear girl." interjected Hannah, wiggling her arms and putting on a misty voice scarily like the professor's.

"No I wasn't." I laughed back, scrunching my hair in my hands, "My birth date is the nineteenth of October 1967, so that means… Oh I don't know. Make something up. Hannah - because of Mercury, your first born's familiar will be a Bubotuber."

"Nooo!" She cried in mock horror "Maddy, I see that because of the positioning of Jupiter's moon Himalia on your third birthday, your thumbs will drop off before the wedding of your one true love."

I began sobbing melodramatically "Why? WHY? Why should such terrors be bequeathed on the young!" Hannah began patting my back awkwardly to make a show of it, and Trelawney hovered over.

"Dear me, has she learned about terrible incidents in her future?" I could hear her ask.

"Oh yes Professor. Her thumbs are going to drop off."

"Poor dear. I remember predicting a similar thing for her elder sister many moons ago. Such a shame. I heard their father was quite the pianist, those two may never have his talent." Hannah and I giggled as Trelawney left us, mumbling to herself pensively.

Just before the lesson was due to end she dropped her act and screeched "Eleven inches on the effect of the four planets furthest from the Sun on your lifetime. For Friday!" The bell rang and we scuttled out, angry at her.

"First lesson, damnit. Even McGonagall didn't do that to us. Bloody bat." I heard someone say as we left the attic, although I was becoming steadily overcome with nerves regarding the potions lesson we were walking towards. My hands started shaking in a way that had only happened to me once before, when I told _Them_ about my Dad being killed, the kind of shake which starts in your elbows and works its way down your arm until your fingers are a blur.

The dungeons were cold and ominous, as I walked the stone corridor I could feel the foreboding creeping into every pore of my body. Davine and Brandon ran up behind us, out of breath.

"Oh -_puff- _thank Merlin _-puff_- Professor Kettleburn was -_puff_- attacked by Kneazles. We thought -_puff_- we'd be late." Davine managed to wheeze.

"Nah." said Hannah, although I was too terrified to speak. I shouldn't have asked those sixth years about it, I realised in hindsight. We lined up with the Hufflepuffs outside the classroom, when we first heard the wonderfully silky voice that could have only belonged to Professor Snape.

"Come in." It gave me shivers, it was so perfectly pronunciated, smooth like a waterfall. I reminded myself silently that this was the man who would surely very soon be screaming at me for blowing up his entire classroom. We filed in and stood at the back of the room, nervous, whilst Snape sat at his desk up the front.

"What are you standing about for? Choose a seat and sit down, I shouldn't think it would be too taxing on your Prefrontal cortex."

Hurriedly, I sat myself with Hannah, as Davine had glued herself to Brandon _again,_ whilst he actually looked like he wanted to shake her off, and started getting out my equipment and book, as did most other people in the class. Snape stood up.

"Afternoon. As you are undoubtedly aware, I am Professor Snape, and I'll be teaching you potions for this year and the next, and beyond, should you choose to go onto, and have the grades for, NEWT level potions." Here he seemed to notice the books out on the benches because he scowled and added -

"I suggest you put away that book; whilst some would consider such asinine instruction plausible, we shan't be using it today, nor, for that matter, the rest of the year.

"Today, I propose that as a kind of a test, I shall start you on a potion from last year. The instructions will be a little different to the ones you used, but they will give the best results if you do them correctly. The potion is a Confusing Concoction, the directions are on the blackboard -" He flicked his wand and the chalk began to scrawl across the surface of the board "- and the ingredients are in the store cupboard, as usual."

We all looked on dumbfounded and he clapped his hands "Come on, get going, it's not going to concoct itself whilst you're gaping like landed fish." Everyone sprung up and began collecting ingredients.

Halfway through our preparation, Snape rose from his desk and began stalking about the dungeon, making comments on people's work.

"Start again on that chickweed, Miss…"

"Butters, Sir." Davine supplied with a tremor in her voice.

"Yes, Miss Butters, I suggest you chop into smaller, and _neater_ sections next time, else your potion will be considerably weakened and the correct colour will not form. _This _chickweed is quite unsalvageable, I'm afraid."

Davine actually started _smiling_ and ran off to collect new chickweed. It surprised me that Snape was being more like that second year had told us he was, and less like Michael and Janine, who I trusted, had said. He swept to the opposite side of the room and began advising David Murray from Hufflepuff on the correct amount of beetle's eyes to use. I set the heat beneath my cauldron and began to add components, following the directions obsessively.

Three clockwise stirs, one anticlockwise, three clockwise, one anticlockwise, leave it to stand for forty-five seconds, add six beetle's eyes, three clockwise stirs…, I began to get into the swing of it. However, as everyone else's potions turned various shades of pale blue, mine was not. Snape became attracted by the greenish vapours rising from Hannah's potion, signifying that it was done.

"Not bad, Miss -"

"- Beldry."

"Yes, three points to Gryffindor for the first completed potion in the class, now if I could - What the hell is that?" He gasped, staring wide-eyed at my potion.

It had become a viscous vermilion semi-solid, bubbling like molten lava in my cauldron, great plopping sounds emitting from it. Snape took his wand from his pocket and flicked it at my potion, but nothing happened. Most of the class had gathered 'round to look, to see a patented Maddy Linure Cauldron Explosion. Looking horrified, Snape backed away from the cauldron.

"Everybody, get behind me and keep as far away from Miss -"

"- Linure!" Shouted most of the class through laughter.

"- Miss Linure's potion, please! I don't need any casualties!"

_OhGodOhGodOhBloodyGod -_ I could hear my internal monologue saying - _Now yer for it!_ A voice of a Hufflepuff boy rang through the chattering - "Why don't you just _Evanesco_ it?"

Snape spun around, his arms still spread in an effort to protect the students against my potion (my cauldron was now shaking where it stood), and his eye gave a single twitch. "Don't you think that perhaps I have already tried that, and Miss Linure's potion seems to be impervious to spells."

"Perhaps you're doing it wrong."

"Oh but of course, Mister Morland. And then I suppose you would be the one who could do it better than I?"

Steve Morland opened his mouth to speak, but obviously couldn't find a comeback, so closed it again. My cauldron gave a frightening rattle and everyone took another step backwards as the potion _erupted_ skyward, hissing as it hit the stone ceiling.

"Ouch." was all Snape could think of to say, but then he fixed a stare on everyone and said "Stop neglecting your potions! Bottle them and hand them in." his voice softened a bit as he looked at Hannah. "I'll still give you the marks for your potion, Miss Beldry." Looking over, I could see what he was talking about. Some of my potion had obviously splashed from the ceiling into Hannah's cauldron, and her perfect potion had been reduced to something of both the consistency and colour of the type of mud that you stand in and can't get out of.

"Miss Linure," he nearly whispered, looking down his hooked nose at me, making me feel awfully short. "I would like to speak to you after class." I gulped, and he swished back to his desk, beginning to check over the potions that had been handed in.

Hannah and I stood by the sinks at the back of the class, as there was no going back to our desk, where the thick potion was still dripping.

"Sorry about that potion, Hannah."

To my surprise, she just smiled in return. "Don't be sorry - I think that's the first time one of your potions hasn't affected any people."

Cautiously, I smiled at the realisation. "Aside from giving Snape a heart attack, of course." She added, still beaming.

My smile dropped. "He wants to talk to me at the end of the lesson. I'm going to _die._ I'll lose every point Gryffindor has collected in the past four hundred years. I'll-"

"Shut up, Maddy. It's fine. If he wanted to take points, he'd take points. It's not your fault that you and potions don't mix."

The bell rang, and everyone but me left the classroom in surprisingly good spirits. Hannah gave an awkward wink and was the last to leave, slamming the door in her wake and leaving a ringing silence between me and Snape.

"Miss Linure, take a stool over and sit in front of my desk instead of lurking in the background like an assassin, if you would." I did as I was told, beads of sweat popping up on my forehead. I put my stool down and sneaked a peek at him as he flipped through pieces of parchment.

From this distance, he looked quite different to how he had at the feast. His hair looked greasy although, to be fair, that was probably from standing in a hot classroom all day, and as if to prove just how young he was, there was a fine row of pimples on the edge of his face where it met his hair, and a few on his chin. His skin was not as white as it had appeared yesterday in the bright candlelight, but more a very pale, dullish yellow, like that of someone suffering from a stress ulcer or the like.

He breathed slowly through his nose and tapped the hand not holding the parchment as he read to some unknown rhythm. His hands were the kind that someone who had never met or seen a pianist might imagine the hands of a pianist looked like - strong, long fingers that were impossibly thin and straight - in reality the hands of a guitarist. Dad had been a pianist, and so had all of his family, their hands had been things of beauty too, it was true, but not in that way.

Finally, Snape looked up and put me out of my misery with a wan smile.

"Miss Linure - sister of Rebecca Linure, sixth year Slytherin?"

I nodded as my throat constricted on itself.

"She's good at potions." he said to himself, and looked at me again. "Are all of your potions attempts this… ah… unfortunate?"

"Yes." I managed to gasp. "They're normally worse." Snape's eyes flickered from my face to the gloop still dripping behind me.

"Hmm…" he hummed like a doctor making a diagnosis, still flicking through the parchment, which I realised belatedly were student files of all our marks. I knew mine all said 'zero'. He must have found mine because he stopped flicking, and an odd rigid smile appeared on his face, at once cold at detached, and strangely calculating.

"Miss Linure." he started, and I stared into his dark eyes in fright. "I think I should be interested in studying your quite… unique potions talent. I don't think I've ever seen such a reaction as _that_ before. If you would be interested in taking a kind of remedial potions class, that is."

I nodded vigorously, stunned that I was being offered to actually _learn_ something in potions.

"Oh, good. Of course I will need to write a note for you to take to Professor McGonagall, asking for permission, but that should be fine." He smiled again, showing all his crooked teeth, and I wondered why he hadn't got them corrected. With magic, it wasn't all that difficult.

"As for the lessons, I don't think it would be safe for you to practice the art of potion-making around other students, but I will set you up with some theory to learn from one of my own books. Would that be acceptable?"

I positively beamed. "I should think so, Sir. I'll get Professor McGonagall's permission to you for tomorrow's lesson then?"

"That would be useful. Remedial classes will be on a Wednesday, I should think. Now, you can head off. I'm going to have to get Filch to clean this up." An odd vindictive glitter came into his eyes as he said that which made me have to stifle a laugh. As I was leaving the room, he piped up one last time.

"Why didn't you quit potions?"

I looked back at him from the doorway, trying to remember my old reasoning for my fascination with the subject. "I want to help my Grandma. I thought if I stayed on, I'd get better."

"With any luck you will, then. Goodbye, Miss Linure."

* * *

_Author's Note - __I've found that certainly in English schools at least, the young, mocking and sarcastic teachers are always the most popular. Which is why it confuses me as to why Snape was not, but I guess things will degenerate from here._

_I got the idea of Snape being nasty to the older years but nice to the younger ones from my Dad, in one of the few times I've spoken to him. He was a French teacher at a secondary school when he was just 19, only three years older than some of the students. He told me he was very harsh on the older students for respect, as it 'didn't matter if they didn't like him, because they'd soon be gone', but he was nice to the younger ones, as he needed them to like him, which would give him more respect the whole way through their school lives. I could see Snape doing something like this. You've also got to remember that the fifth, sixth and seventh years knew him when he was at school as a bit of a pushover - he wants to show them that he's changed._

_Hurrah for **whitehound**_. _She's helped me so much, for which I will be forever grateful. My damn sarcy Snape wasn't sarcy enough._

_Anyways, please, if you really want to show me you care, review this chapter. Tell me what you like, what you don't like, what irritates you, what makes you want to scream, what was wrong - ANYTHING._

_I realise that it is a little slow, but I just wanted to start off slow and quicken the pace later. Here's a question for you - how many lessons are there in a Hogwarts day? I think in some books there are four, but in others there are five. At my school there are five, so I'm going for that. :)_

_I promise to reply to you to explain/debate/be corrected._

_The little button, it says - 'Push me, pleaseee'. :D _


	3. Chapter 3: Rien perdu n'est rien gagné

_Disclaimer - Evening, Half-drowned Dracula here. I'm getting my GCSE certificates on Monday (And my school's prize for science, because I'm a dork) - this can only mean one thing - I'm not JKR and therefore own none of the stuff that isn't mine!_

_Author's Note - Chapter 3, coming up. This chapter touches on the idea of under-age sex, but it's not clear either way. These kids are 14/15, and the British age of consent is 16. Oh, and I'm really not sure of my translation for the title, despite having a Frenchman for a father I'm still pathetic at French, and I refuse to use online translators. If you have a clue about how wrong/right it is, tell me so!_

* * *

**Chapter 3 : Rien perdu n'est rien gagné**

I closed the door behind me, and rose my hands into a silent cheer of joy as a walked away, at some points literally _skipping_ on my journey to McGonagall's office. I squeaked a little bit in excitement as I reached her door, knocking three times.

"Come in." her voice came dreary through the door.

"Oh, Miss Linure, nice to see you. Come, sit over by my desk. Ginger Newt?"

I politely refused, and then stuttered.

"P-professor McGonagall, Professor Sn-Snape gave me this for you to sign."

A passing look of horror flashed over her face as she took the parchment from me, but as she read the corners of her mouth lifted.

"Nice to see that _someone_ is trying to help you with your potioneering, at last. I will have to thank Professor Snape when I next see him. Is that all?"

"Yes, Professor."

She gave me a soft smile that passed as quickly as the blink of an eye, and gave the now signed parchment back to me.

After leaving, I got back into my usual school day routine pretty quickly - head off to the common room, leave with friends for dinner, go back into the dorm. It was only in the dorm quite a bit later that we noticed a small difference.

"Where's Davine?" Emma's question fell into silence and Hannah turned quite pink.

"She's spending the night in the boy's dorm." she whispered, and her head seemed to shrink into her body.

"That's disgusting. We're only fourteen. That's… ugh."

Although we were surprised Megan had joined our conversation, Emma and I smiled at her in agreement.

"She's only there because, uh, she thinks Brandon will have nightmares."

We contemplated this for a moment, and I shook my head.

"There must be a rule against doing _that_, y'know. Where's she going to sleep?"

"She said she'd sleep on the floor."

"I wouldn't be surprised if she was in his bed tomorrow morning. 'Ohh, he had a nightmare, I _had_ to comfort him.'" Megan added, quite viciously actually, and we turned to her.

"That was quite rude. I'm going to bed now." Emma and I murmured in agreement, and turned out the lights. I lay awake in bed, restless, long after the others had drifted off, my sleep coming and going in short bursts.

Tuesday morning I awoke for the fifth time and finally got out of bed, disorientated at being the first up. I crept from our dorm into the forth year boy's dorm, finding, to my dismay, that Megan had been quite correct last night. I shuffled to Brandon's bed in my slippers and hastily woke Davine up.

"Davine… You've got to get up."

"Huh?" she squinted at me.

"You've got to get out of Brandon's bed. Megan'll go mad!"

Eventually she climbed out of Brandon's bed, smoothing out her nightdress. I asked no questions, I thought it was best not to know, showered, dressed myself and went to breakfast less dishevelled than I ever had before.

The Gryffindor table was as empty as I'd ever seen it at a meal time, bar over the Christmas holidays, just us and three frightened-looking first-years, who I assume had woken up as early as they could to avoid missing breakfast. Snape wasn't over at the High Table again, although he had been for dinner last night, and Professors Dumbledore, Davies and McGonagall sat alone, Davies looking very out of the loop, the other teachers not up yet.

"You won't tell them, will you?" Davine looked at me, frightened.

"Wh- Tell who?" I mentally berated myself for spending too much time paying attention to teachers and not my friends.

"Hannah and Emma and Megan and them. That I was... I mean... With Brandon... We didn't... Honestly... Just... The floor's cold!" she was rambling ridiculously, and I raised my hand to silence her.

"I didn't see anything..." I said as simply as I could, and turned my attention to an almond croissant, watching the doors for Hannah. It pained me to realise there was really no conversation between Davine and I anymore, although the silence wasn't completely uncomfortable, truth be told.

Becky and a bunch of her fiends – Freudian slip – _friends_, came cackling into the Great Hall, although Merlin knows what they were laughing about, it seemed to be quite funny – the monstrous Pepper Samson looked on the verge of an asthma attack, sucking in a lot of air, her face going disgustingly red. More people were streaming into the Hall by now, and instead of ignoring me as usual, Rebecca used it as cover to smack me around the back of the head as she passed, for no good reason.

Michael sat down opposite me. "Your sister's a slag, Maddy. Bat-bogey her or something!" Rebecca turned and gave him her nastiest sneer.

"Push off, Nunnes. We all know Madeline isn't capable of such spell-work, anyway." she clicked away on her high-heeled shoe-boots before anyone could curse her.

When Hannah finally came to the table, so did the conversation, which was a relief, and eventually it was time for our first lesson, the usually exciting DADA.

Davies was a joke. He had a terrible lisp, and spent most of the class-time telling curse-breaking anecdotes that were hard to decipher.

"Gohblihns plache flesch-deshtroying curhses upon anchient ruinsh ofh their own spechial interesht around the wohrld. Profeschor Schnape, forh exchample, worked on the underground schity ofh Fhordan in Rhuscia, where many men were killed in the earhly nineteenth centhury. Youh can rehcognishe such shpells by..."

We nodded and grinned, and didn't listen to a word he said. I resigned myself to the fact that, yet again, we would learn nothing in Defence

I made my way to Potions in an almost trance-like state, speaking to Brandon's friends Eric and Carl. They were nice enough chaps, I decided – quite smart, sometimes funny and almost good-looking, if you discounted Eric's massively thick glasses, and Carl's fuzzy, underdeveloped, ginger moustache.

Entering the Potions classroom was a pretty straightforward task after we knew what to do. I took my place next to Hannah, Snape gave a speech, and then there were instructions on the board, ingredients in the cupboard and a classroom full of readied students. And a low voice in my ear.

I nearly jumped out of my skin.

"Miss Linure. Please be kind enough to give me your full attention next time." I nodded apologetically, frightened to turn in case he was scarily close to my face.

Snape's long fingers slid an open book beneath my face. "Read it. Don't just memorise it either. _Understand_ it. That is the key."

I nodded frantically and pored over the minuscule script of Snape's book. Occasionally there were scribbles and crossed-out paragraphs, replaced with tiny, scrawled annotations. I wondered if it was Snape's writing, but then decided against that thought. It was the exact kind of writing teachers _abhorred_ – illegible and microscopic, screaming of a lack of confidence.

It was _fascinating_. How one ingredient could change the properties of a potion – a drop too many could cause explosions unlike anything even _I_ had ever created, a drop too few could reduce it to worthless slop. By the end of class session, I was loath to return the book. I didn't even notice when the bell rang.

"Miss Linure.... Miss Linure!"

A slim, white hand appeared before my face and clicked it's fingers. I'm ashamed to say that I shrieked - the room was empty aside from me and Snape, and my embarrassing, high-pitched note echoed through the dungeon.

"Nice to know that I'm that frightening, Miss Linure." Snape smiled sarcastically, and I cringed.

"Ooh, sorry, Professor, I'm just – I mean -"

"Are you permitted to the Remedial Potions class?"

"Oh, yes!" I fumble awkwardly in my bag and come out with a crumpled permission slip. Snape snatched it swiftly from my hands, and flattened it on the desk.

"Thank you very much. Now – What _are _you doing?"

In my nervous state I had packed his book away into my bag – Snape looked on with a smirk across his sharp features.

"Thievery, Miss Linure? I had thought you above that."

"Ahhhhh." I panicked, and Snape's vindictive smile grew as I tried, unsuccessfully, to remove said book from my bag. "I am _so_ sorry, Professor Snape!" I managed, still frightened for my life. To my surprise, Snape simply waved a hand at me.

"Oh, have it. Nothing lost is nothing gained, or so they say."

"They do?"

"I've heard so, yes. Just make sure you take better care of it than you have _that_." He was looking at the still pathetically creased permission slip I had handed him back. "This is, of course, under the belief that you will study the book closely, and _learn_ from it?"

"Of course, Sir." I said, like the nasty little suck-up I was.

"Good. I will see you tomorrow evening at six, then."

I raced from the room.

I wish I could say that the rest of the day passed in a blur, but it didn't. It dragged out horribly until I was bored almost to tears, as did the next. Wednesday, at six precisely, I found myself outside Snape's classroom with sweaty palms and a throbbing mind. Three sharp knocks to the heavy wooden door and -

"Do come in, Miss Linure."

I swung the door open and entered the lion's den.

* * *

_Author's Notes - Wahh, I'm still not completely sure of this chapter, and I greatly doubt anyone was actually waiting for it, but I needed to write it. I've been neglecting this fic and my muse was seriously injured in a freak accident, I'm not even sure now if it's fully recovered._

_ALAS: here it is, in all it's 'splendour'. Now you have to tell me how to fix it. I need your help, or I'll fail as a writing-type person. And I know it's not very long. I'm working on it._

_Press the review button, and all will be well._


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